Chapter Text
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The sun blared down through the trees as a hot wind picked up in swirls of dust and leaves. Various bird noises filled the early summer air and a lone building stood a fair distance from the main city in the middle of the old dense forest. The isolated property had always been the subject of many tall tales and ghost stories. The fact that it was also a mortuary with a graveyard didn't help with the rumors in the least.
Luffy walked through towering rusted wrought iron gates that surrounded the old graveyard. The massive and sharp iron spires towered over him and screamed to keep away while the swirly, intricate designs gave it an antique feeling. The air felt somewhat unsettling as soon as he passed the threshold. He looked up at the old fashioned Victorian house that stood proudly in the center of the various grave markers like an eerie fortress. It was the kind of place every kid knew was haunted and every kid was dared to sneak into at least once.
He remembered sneaking through the iron gates himself once as a child, egged on by the neighborhood kids. Back then the property felt so big and endless, with wild grasses and mangled trees. Now it felt so much smaller, the grasses not as tall but just as wild and messy. Luffy remembered tripping over a gravestone and scraping his knee back then. He remembered cold hands and piercing golden eyes while being bandaged up and getting scolded. He remembered a white spotted hat disappearing into the tall grass and his brothers' furious voices yelling at him to get out of there.
Thirteen years later he stood there again, now twenty years old and desperate for a job. Usopp thought he was insane looking for work at such a creepy place, but Luffy had never really been afraid of it even back then. It never felt scary to him, if anything it always felt oddly peaceful. He noticed that the bright yellow paint was new, clearly done recently to make it look more cheery and inviting because the building from his memory was definitely black and rotting.
He took a breath and stepped up the newly replaced stairs to the porch. The sign above the door read 'The Polar Tang Mortuary.' Such a strange name, and he couldn't remember if it had always been called that, but regardless he rang the bell and waited.
He fidgeted in the long pants he wore, not used to wearing something so heavy and chaffing. Nami even made him wear shoes, confiscating his sandals for the day. He was here for an interview to be the new groundskeeper, and just at a glance he could tell they desperately needed one. It wasn't surprising really, what kind of business didn't even have a website? The door opened and he was met with a redheaded man with a whale hat and sunglasses.
"Hey there!" The man greeted with an easy grin. "What can I do for ya, cutie?"
"Uh. I'm here for an interview?" Luffy answered looking confused.
"Oh." The man cleared his throat awkwardly. "Let's just uh, forget that happened. Come on in." He stepped aside to let Luffy through the door. The room looked like one of those old houses he'd seen in movies, kinda creepy but brightly lit with lots of flower arrangements and a strong smell of incense. "Right this way!"
Luffy followed the man to a room with couches and a coffee table. He assumed it would have been the living room of the house but it felt a bit more like a lobby. There was a fireplace with photos on the mantle and the walls had generic looking paintings he didn't bother looking at. The man gestured for him to take a seat and Luffy did his best to sit like normal person instead of sitting cross legged on someone else's couch. It wasn't particularly comfortable, and was definitely ancient judging by the fancy wood details. The coffee table between him and the whale man had the same intricate swirls and designs on its legs. Everything was so eerily quiet he could hear the walls creaking. There was no AC running in the background, not even an electric or ceiling fan, and yet the place felt cold despite the summer heat outside.
"So, Monkey D. Luffy, correct?" The whale man asked without removing his sunglasses. Luffy nodded with what he hoped was a polite smile. Nami always told him not to grin too much in these settings, but not too little either and he honestly had no idea what that even meant.
"You can call me Shachi!" The man greeted as he held out his hand. Luffy took it and shook, making sure not to accidentally squeeze too hard. Usopp said his grip was too strong sometimes. "So! What made you want to work here at the mortuary?"
"Uh. Well, my friend suggested it to me. And I'm pretty good with physical work." Luffy answered with a grin before clearing his throat when he noticed it was one of his big grins.
"Any prior experience with grounds keeping or landscaping?"
"I cut grass for people one summer," Luffy felt like that was probably not the best way to respond but it was the truth. Shachi nodded his head as he made a little note.
"Good, good." He mused as he looked over a file. "You come highly recommended by Usopp from the Syrup Nursery, is that the friend you mentioned?"
"Yup!" Luffy was starting to feel a little less awkward about the whole thing. The questions were way easier than everyone made them sound.
"I don't see the nursery here on your application, just the reference. What did you do there?" Shachi looked over his sunglasses, giving Luffy a view of his eyes for the first time. They were sharp and calculating. Very different than his strange hat and demeanor let on.
"I uh, didn't really work there, work there," Luffy rubbed the back of head. "But I always helped out whenever Usopp asked, usually moving heavy boxes of soil or plants."
"I see." Shachi made a few more notes in the file and grinned. "How knowledgeable are you about horticulture?"
Luffy stared bug eyed. He had no idea what that word meant and now he was sweating a bit. "Um," was all he could manage. Shachi grinned mischievously.
"I'm just messing with you, kid. Well, kinda. Horticulture is growing various plants, we have several specific species we cultivate here that we'd like avoid getting mowed down by accident. We don't mind training you in recognizing them so no worries."
Luffy barely hid his sigh of relief but he caught Shachi's teasing glint over his sunglasses. He seemed like a fun guy.
"Well it looks like everything is in order. How soon would you be able to start?"
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PirateKing56: Interview done
moneytalk$: Oh? How'd it go?
SniperKinGG: Did they make you dig a grave?
moneytalk$: Why would they make him dig a grave???
SniperKinGG: I dont know! That place is CREEPY
Chefoflove: That makes zero sense
SoulKingBrook: Come on Luffy I'm just DYING to know yohohohoho!!
PirateKing56: It was fine?
moneytalk$: That's it??
moneytalk$: Come on give us the deets!!!
PirateKing56: He asked me questions I answered I start tomorrow
SniperKinGG: THATS SUSPICIOUS
PirateKing56: ???
SniperKinGG: What kind of interview is like that? Just one? No trick questions? No 5D chess??? SUSPICIOUS
SniperKinGG: Not to mention the whole paper application thing! Who doesn't have a website?! My nose always knows, something there is rotten!
Jinbei: Well it is a graveyard.
Robin: Mortuary.
PirateKing56: Theres a difference?
SUPERfranky: Congratulations lil dude! We should SUPER celebrate!
PirateKing56: PARTY! SANJI FOOD!
Chefoflove: Yeah yeah. Somebody grab mosshead and Chopper
---
Dr. Trafalgar Law watched from the second story office window as the young interviewee left the grounds. The office was lined in bookshelves stuffed full of almost every subject and several tables for the four brothers to work without tripping all over each other. Law scowled as he brooded over the window. He wasn't thrilled at the prospect of employing an outsider, let alone a normal human, but Shachi's insistence finally wore him down.
"What do you think Bepo?" He asked solemnly without looking back. A large man with a kind face wearing a white beanie with bear ears sat at a table studying various instruments and documents in front of him.
"His birth chart looks quite energetic, some hardships at home and finances, sociable but stubborn." Law grimaced. Energetic and sociable were not two qualities he personally enjoyed being around. "As for the card readings...hmm how odd."
"What is it?" Law sighed.
"Well the first card is the Sun, not too surprising he seemed like a bright soul." Bepo reported. "But the second two cards..."
"Get on with it..."
"Death and the Lovers."
"Okay?" Law had little patience for divination, it was always so vague and rarely reliable. Even if Bepo's skills were abnormally accurate, he still preferred the predictable outcomes and hard results of more hands on magic.
"Well normally it would denote a major transformation in his future, but this is a reading on his time working here so it's a little odd."
"Maybe he's meant to fall in love with our resident Dr. Death in the graveyard," Penguin grinned smugly as Law glared.
"You aren't supposed to read them literally!" Bepo huffed. He was a gentle man but was quite passionate about his craft and didn't much appreciate his brothers' snide remarks. "The Lover's rarely actually means literal lovers, its a card of duality, of choices..." Bepo continued his lecture on tarot that they'd all heard far too many times to bother listening to.
"Cards or no cards," Shachi interrupted as he entered the room. "He was the only applicant."
Law sighed as he felt a headache coming on. All he could do was wait and see, if the human became a nuisance he would just get rid of him. Not that Law wasn't human himself, he and his brothers were just as mortal as the young man who'd just left, but they were anything but normal. Law had spent the past fourteen years studying and mastering the art of necromancy, communing with and commanding the dead. Although most of his work was just actual run of the mill mortuary work like preparing the deceased, laying them to rest, and guarding over their graves. Still, he disliked the living. His brothers were the exception, but only just barely as they enjoyed annoying him far too much. He'd kill anyone who tried to hurt them without a second thought of course, but they didn't need to know that.
Just as Law was about to leave the room, the old rotary phone in the parlor started ringing. He grimaced as Penguin rushed downstairs to answer it. None of them had mobile phones or even personal computers. Something about their magic just made modern technology go haywire, and so the only means to contact the mortuary was the singular rotary phone. Law didn't understand why their magic worked with old tech, usually anything before the 1940s was fine, but he didn't really care much. Although it was one of the reasons he focused his medical studies on postmortem rather than working with living patients. His magic always messed with all the more advanced technology. Even morgues had started upgrading their equipment and procedures, forcing Law into an early change of career. Well, that and old man Wolf finally kicking the bucket, leaving the mortuary to his four adopted sons. The only one who really cared about it was Shachi. He loved technology and had dedicated all of this free time to trying to figure out the mechanism behind the incompatibility.
"Law! Detective Smoker's on the line!" Penguin's muffled voice carried through the old mortuary. Law sighed as he pried himself from his broody perch at the window and headed downstairs to see what mess he needed to clean up this time.